


gods and monsters

by Mayarene Rose (Paradise_of_Mary_Jane)



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dark fic, aka 'what if cw actually let cisco use his powers'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-22
Updated: 2018-04-22
Packaged: 2019-04-26 08:56:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14398656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paradise_of_Mary_Jane/pseuds/Mayarene%20Rose
Summary: Sometimes, Cisco wonders if this is what Reverb meant, if this is being what a god is. Does it matter what he fights for when he can kill a man with a breath?Does it matter what he believes in when the power to destroy and create everything rests on his whim?He has the power of a god. Does it matter if he still wants to be human?Cisco decides he's had enough. He goes to find Devoe. Coda to 4x10





	gods and monsters

**Author's Note:**

> so,, i'm back with another fic fleshing out cisco's powers and character because the cw refuses to,, 
> 
> Onwards!

Cisco is the most powerful metahuman on Earth-1. Most of the time, anyway; unless other more experienced vibers from different Earths decide they want dinner dates. Anyway, he’s the most powerful meta native to Earth-1 and people… People tend to forget that.

It works out in his favor, most of the time. It’s not like Cisco wants more reminders that he can literally destroy the planet with a flick of his wrist. He has enough nightmares about that, thank you very much.

He doesn’t like it, likes it better when he’s messing with tech, with things with actual rules and limitations. Things he knows. Likes being the man in the chair, the voice whispering (or shouting) in the superhero’s ear.

And when he does end up using his powers, it’s basically a fist fight. It’s vibration blasts. It’s portals for quick getaways. Easy and simple, really, though he doesn’t let on. Nothing big. Never anything big. He doesn’t want to push it and he doesn’t think his friends really get the ‘can feel and manipulate the vibration of every single molecule’ bit, or not the full extent of it, anyway, so Cisco gets away with it.

Cisco is an engineer and also kind of a physicist who has an imagination that’s bigger than most. Evil Wells had taken him under his wing and for better or worse, cultivated it, honed it to an intricate tool that creates things that are both cool and also scary as hell. Evil Wells was good, he knew that Cisco’s imagination was his limit so he made sure that his imagination was limitless. Cisco was his weapon, in a way, and he made sure he had a great one.

Well, Evil Wells has been gone for a long time now and Cisco uses the things he was given for different things, to help people. There’s still some part of him that pushes past that, goes further than what morality might allow. He doesn’t like it but it is what it is.  He holds back to compensate. He can’t destroy the world if he doesn’t use his powers.

But the possibility is still there and his imagination doesn’t let him forget. And right now, he doesn’t like where it takes him. He ignores it, most of the time.

There are things he can do. Things he’s capable of doing that don’t involve his powers. Cisco mostly sticks with that. He knows better than anyone what happens when Cisco crosses the line.

Usually. The mess they’re in right now, it’s not usual.

The Thinker… Devoe, he’s something else. Devoe is shielded from him. He can predict the future, predict the specific steps to get the outcome he wants, but somehow, Cisco can’t seem to figure out what the end goal is. Devoe keeps things in too much flux, a thousand possibilities emerging with each step he takes and creates another thousand and only he knows, letting things shift and ride the waves and just know where it’s gonna take him.

Devoe is literally predicting the unpredictable and using it to hurt Cisco’s friends and take over the world. It’s not quite a superpower, just a really good balance of probability. Whatever the case, Cisco doesn’t like it.

When he manages to frame Barry for his murder, Cisco has had enough. Devoe thinks he’s won. Right now, it looks like he has, acting all high and mighty with his knowledge and his plans and his predictions.

Thing is, either he doesn’t know or he forgot about the extent of Cisco’s powers. At any rate, Devoe’s not the only one who knows the future and Cisco’s pissed off enough to fuck shit up.

 

\--

 

He thinks about telling the team but then… That would mean telling the team. Everything, including the extent off what he can do. His power. What he could have saved and what he could have stopped and what he could have done, had he wanted. And that still scares the shit out of Cisco, he’s not about to go around telling people about it.

They will say they accept him at first but that’s really just missing the point. It’s not a matter of acceptance, it’s a matter of practicality. Cisco is basically a ticking time bomb. 

Best keep it quiet; best not to cause a panic.

Besides, he likes being underestimated, likes being a sidekick. Cisco’s not here to save the world, not anymore or at least not like before. Mostly, he just wants to keep his friends safe.

The particle accelerator made heroes and it made villains. Cisco is neither and he doesn’t want to be. Not with the power he has. He just wants the people he loves to make it through another day.

 

\--

 

It’s easy to look, if he lets it be, so he does.

He does it in his apartment so there’s no chance of anyone just walking in.

Devoe and his plan is still shielded from him, but that doesn’t matter, in the grand scheme of things. Devoe is incredibly brilliant but he’s just one man with a finite plan and a finite life, smaller than a speck in a universe’s eternity. Cisco can see all of the future so he looks. 

He doesn’t see the outcome of Devoe’s plan but he sees what happens alongside it, sees what happens after. It’s enough. It’s really a matter of reverse engineering from there.

Cisco knows what to do.

 

\--

 

He writes letters because they seem like the thing to do. No one’s going to read them but it makes him feel better. Less lonely.

He’s written a lot of letters in the past few years. He keeps them locked in his underwear drawer in his apartment. No one reads them and he doesn’t reread them. They’re just there, gathering dust. They’re just words that he needed to get out, no reason for them to be actually known.

Keeping secrets is lonely. Being a coward with a group of heroes is lonely.

Mostly, he apologizes. There’s a lot to apologize for. He can stop every bad thing that’s going to happen, stop villains before they even think about becoming villains. He can save lives. He can make everything  _ better. _

He’s no god, though, has no right to dictate what’s right and what’s wrong, and the world doesn’t need one. The world needs heroes. People who are good, who do good, who make mistakes but still strive to make things better. 

Gods are the ones who takes the choice away.

The world doesn’t need Cisco Ramon to try to be a hero, not when it’ll just make him a god. The world needs him to stay human.

 

\--

 

Iris tries to be strong. It’s hard to be when it feels like you keep losing. They go on like they always did because this is normal for them, more of a regular job for them than their actual regular job. Better if they got paid for it but that’s how it is.

They try to be there for her but the team is fractured without Barry. He’s their light, their reason for being. They’re all just sort of stumbling without him.

Team Flash isn’t really much of team without the Flash.

Cisco brought him back from the speedforce and what is essentially death. He’s pretty sure he can save him from a guy who thinks too much.

No one expects him to. No one even asks him to. Harry keeps coming up with even more ridiculously complex plans and Ralph cracks jokes and Iris tries to stay strong. Cisco wishes he could tell them that it’ll all be over soon.

They don’t ask anything from him. That works out just fine.

 

\--

 

Killer Frost is the one who figures it out which shouldn’t have been surprising. Cisco waited too long.

“So you finally decide to do something, huh?”

Cisco’s come to tolerate the blonde hair and icy attitude. Still hates her with a passion but he learns to live with it. He’s learned to live with a lot of things.

He doesn’t bother denying it.

“Does Caitlin know?” he asks. They’re in his workshop, what used to be the safest place in the world for him. Safety ceases to exist when you end up in more near death situations than professional life riskers or something.

“Caitlin is an idiot.”

_ You’re Caitlin,  _ he wants to tell her but that’s not going to go over well. Caitlin is his best friend. Killer Frost is his used-to-be-enemy. Somehow, they’re still pretending those are two different people.

Killer Frost leans close to him, puts a cold hand to his cheek. Cisco doesn’t flinch away.

“You and I are a lot alike, you know,” she says. “We look out for ourselves.”

Cisco doesn’t bother denying that, either. Not with what he’s about to do. What he’s failed to do.

“You’re no hero,” she says.

“I never said I was.”

“Then why--”

“Don’t,” Cisco snaps, slapping her hand away. “Don’t even go there. If you’re going to betray us, you don’t need my damn help to do it.”

“Caitlin doesn’t want me to.”

“And that’s actually stopping you?”

“Caitlin would do anything for Cisco. She wants to help you. Or stop you, whichever comes first. She seems to be under the impression you’re a good person.”

“You mean  _ you _ want to help me. No thanks, by the way. I’m doing this alone.”

“I’m not Caitlin. I’m Killer Frost. If I was Caitlin, I’d try to stop you.”

“Stop lying to yourself Cait,” he says wearily. “You never developed an alter ego, you just wish you did. And you know you can’t stop me.”

“You don’t know anything about me, you just pretend you do.”

Cisco snorts and turns away. Conversations with Killer Frost have stopped hurting a long time ago. Now he’s just tired. “I know everything,” he says. “People tend to forget that.”

 

\--

 

Walking into Devoe’s house seems to be the easiest way to get what he wants, so that’s what he does. Unlike Barry though, Cisco remembers to do it in costume.

The living room is empty, barely lived in. Pretty but too neat. There’s not much of the Devoes’ in this house. He shuffles through the papers on the living room table. He takes everything he can use. Devoe can’t hide everything from him.

The air shifts. Cisco lets out a breath.

“I know you’re there,” he calls out. “Come out. I just want to talk.”

Devoe emerges in the new body he stole, seated on that floating chair. He feels familiar and not at the same time. Different body, same soul. The union is… anomalous. Wrong.

He regards Cisco curiously. Cisco evens out his breathing, listens to the way the air trembles and matches each breath to that.

“I don’t have to remind you, Mr. Ramon,” Devoe says, “what happened to the last person who threatened me.”

“Well, first, people don’t actually convict superheroes in this city so that’s out, and second, you say that as if I still have something to lose.”

“Don’t you?”

Cisco steps closer. “You’re the guy who’s supposed to know everything,” he says. “You tell me.”

Devoe tilts his head. He hovers in front of Cisco. He makes a motion as if to reach out, but jerks his hand away instead.

“You fascinate me, Cisco. I can’t seem to account for you in my plans. You are… shielded from me.”

That is new information to Cisco but perhaps something that shouldn’t be surprising. Knowing the future is not supposed to be a thing. It makes sense that the fact that some people do would make things paradoxical. Maybe it’s the universe’s way of compensating.

“Same here,” he says. “Doesn’t matter, though.”

“And yet.” Devoe tilts his head curiously, like Cisco is a particularly interesting specimen. “You haven’t done anything.”

“Well you didn’t seem to matter before,” Cisco says. “Just another big bad. We’ve had a lot of those.”

Devoe is human. They’ve faced down gods. Faced down sentient forces of nature. Faced down Barry’s bad decisions. They’ve faced worse. Cisco thought they had him. It would be hard. Devoe is a genius, but at the end of the day, he’s  _ human.  _

It should have been easy.

It wasn’t. Cisco isn’t losing another friend to another madman. It’s time this ended.

“And now?”

“Now, I just got my friend back and you seem to be determined to destroy his life. To destroy all of our lives. I’m not going to let you.”

Selfish. Cisco is selfish. He doesn’t want to be a hero. He just wants to protect his friends. Wants to protect the life he’s built.

“Are you here to kill me?” Devoe asks. The thought seems to amuse him.

“No,” Cisco says, after a moment. He kneels down and presses his hand to the floor. Takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. He feels Devoe’s eyes on him, like a knife. “Like I said, I came to talk.”

“And what do you have to say?”

The future, at least the way he sees it, is set. It’s a series of threads, billions and billions of them that converge on one source. There are things that cannot be changed. Things that have to happen. The in-between doesn’t matter. They’re all going to the same place.

He knows how this story will end.

“You’re going to lose,” he says. The future seems so far away, but it will happen. The golden age of heroes will come. Things will get better. Central City will shine like a beacon. Cisco just has to be patient. Cisco’s gotten very good at being patient. “I don’t know when, I don’t know how, but you will lose. Barry will live. He’s going to make a ridiculously long line of speedsters, all fighting in his name. Central City will thrive. Metahumans will be free. And in all of that, you’re not there. Your wife’s not there.Your descendants aren’t there. The  _ memory of you  _ isn’t there. You’re just another villain and one way or the other, you’re not going to get what you want.”

“And how do you know this?”

“You’re not the only one who can peek into the future. Mine’s more advanced. It’s never wrong, trust me.”

“I make my own future,” Devoe says.

“That’s what they all say.” 

Cisco opens his eyes and lets out a breath.

The world is his to shape. People should really stop forgetting that.

 

\--

 

Sometimes, Cisco wonders if this is what Reverb meant, if this is being what a god is. Does it matter what he fights for when he can kill a man with a breath?

Does it matter what he believes in when the power to destroy and create everything rests on his whim?

He has the power of a god. Does it matter if he still wants to be human?

Either way, he fails.

 

\--

 

He doesn’t kill Clifford Devoe because he doesn’t need to.

He’s not Barry, is not as good as he is. Cisco knows he goes too far, knows he crosses lines. He did it when he was just a bright-eyed scientist with too much time and resources in his hands and he still does it with the power of everything. His power is an exercise in restraint, a reminder that there’s such a thing as overkill. Cisco learns to do what needs to be done, nothing less but nothing more, either.

Clifford Devoe doesn’t need to die.

Cisco closes his eyes. He hasn’t needed the goggles in a long time, just liked the focus it gave him. He doesn’t really need to raise his arms, either, just force habit. He is the most powerful metahuman on Earth and this? This is easier than child’s play.

It takes a breath and the chair is pulled apart. Another to start an earthquake.

Another before thousands of pounds of air pressure crashes down around the Thinker. Not enough to kill, but enough to destroy everything that matters to him. Enough to cut off the parts of his mind that is smart enough to win this game. He tries to run but everything exists within its own frequency, even souls. Cisco knows how to keep him in his place.

Devoe screams. He’s not going to die but he’s going to wish he did. And maybe a part of Cisco is just a little cruel. No one hurts his friends and gets away with it. No one.

A breath released in stillness. There is only silence. Nothing left to be said.

Maybe this is how it was actually supposed to go. Maybe Cisco intervened and there was supposed to be a bigger, more significant fight. It doesn’t matter. 

It’s done. 

 

\--

 

Cisco crawls back into bed in costume and barely remembers to take off his goggles. He’s asleep within minutes.

There’s going to be so many questions in the morning but that’s what mornings are for. For now, he’s going to sleep.

Earth continues to turn. It’s a good night, all things considered.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not really as into this fandom as I used to (this is really really late because the first draft of this was way saltier and I don't really want to put _all_ my saltiness in my fics) but i'm still on [tumblr](https://discowlng.tumblr.com) if y'all want to chat about the flash :D


End file.
